


Eyes That Watch

by tangelotime



Category: The Blackout Club (Video Game)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, Horror, Pressganging a teenager into serving an eldritch hivemind horror
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-08
Updated: 2019-04-08
Packaged: 2020-01-07 01:32:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,292
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18400403
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tangelotime/pseuds/tangelotime
Summary: Dip wakes up, but upright, cramped, aching, and confused. They’re not on the couch were they fell asleep. They’re huddled in the dark of their coat closet, in front of the utilities panel. The song from their dream still echoes in their head, and no matter how much they try to shake it out, it doesn’t fade.----Dip doesn't want much- just for their family to stay intact, but if there's a word that describes their life, "lucky" isn't it.





	Eyes That Watch

**Author's Note:**

> Stalker fic! I've been sucked into the wonderful little game called The Blackout Club, a 4 person co-op horror game, where your brain might not be just your brain. 
> 
> I wanted to take a look at the control CHORUS has over their community, besides the obvious mind control that happens every night, and explore some of the reasons a stalker kid might stalk! Thanks to pigeonfancier for a bit of help with the formatting. 
> 
> Character notes: Dip is in fact nb! They use they/them pronouns.

Dip wakes up in the early hours of the morning drenched in cold sweat. Their head is full of red fog of muted shades and voices in the mist arguing in a pitched whispers.

They shake their head of it. Dreams. It’s just dreams. It’s not the first time they’ve had the dream, and it’s never easy to fall asleep afterwards. They peel back their covers and sit up.

Unlike their older sibling, Lochan sleeps soundly in bed, tucked around his rocket plushie, his short dark hair a muss over his face. Dip checks the clock- the little numbers glow green on the table that sits between their beds. The interface reads a blinking 3:41 am.

The dreams are waking up them up earlier and earlier now, and trying to sleep again has never helped. So instead they swing their feet out of bed, grab their glasses, careful to step where the floorboards won’t creak and slip out the room to splash water on their face.

Their house is serviceable but it isn’t exactly brand new. The floors are creaky, the furnace knocks in the pipes, and sound travels through the walls. As Dip creeps quietly past their mother’s bedroom, they hear a door from downstairs open and shut. They freeze in place.

“Mom?” they whisper. They peek inside her room, but her bed is empty. They abandon silence and rush down the stairs.

“Mom?” they ask again, a little louder. The lights are still off, but the front door is ajar. Dip grabs a jacket off the banister and slings it over their pajamas as they run out the door. It was so late- where was their mother going? She was sick, she needed her rest.

They stick their bare feet into their sneakers. The front door is ajar so either she must have left, though her shoes still sitting on the stand.

“Ma!” they call again as they step out the door. No one responds, but under the yellow light of the street lamps, they spot her in the street, wandering aimlessly. She’s still in her pajamas, an old t-shirt and flannel pants, her long dark hair still loose and tangled. She walks, barefoot in the street, her hands outstretched in front of her.

“Mom!” They run up to her, grabbing her hand and tugging her over to face them but her eyes are closed and her breathing heavy. Was she sleeping?

“Mom, wake up!” Dip reaches up to take her by the shoulder and give her a shake, but when she turns, she speaks hoarsely in a voice they barely recognize

“ **Sʜᴇ ᴡɪʟʟ ɴᴏᴛ ᴡᴀᴋᴇ** ,” she says. “ **Sʜᴇ ᴡᴀʟᴋs ᴡɪᴛʜ ᴛʜᴇ Sᴏɴɢ** **.”**

What was that supposed to mean? Dip grabs her by the arms to try and pull her back towards the house, but she resists, and grabs them by the arms and holds them. Her grip is tight enough to hurt, and it’s not so easy to pull away.

It’s not a grip she’d have ever used on them while she was awake. This sleepwalking episode wasn’t anything- _anything_ , like their mother. What could she be dreaming about?

“Mom!” they shout into her face, shaking her as hard as they can. “Wake up!”

The bushes rustle, and Dip freezes. Children have been disappearing in Redacre, and no one knows why. Were they about to find out?

Into the lights cast on the streets, more people wander in. Dip recognizes them as their neighbors- Mr. and Ms. Berewidth, Harvey the gardener, Jules from school, and others they didn’t recognize. The thing that sends a chill running down their spine is the fact they all have their eyes closed. They’re sleepwalking, and closing in. Something is deeply, deeply wrong.

“Mom!” they beg, and tear themself out of her grip. She’s left marks on their skin, where her nails dug into their arms, and backs away from the incoming sleepwalkers. “Wake up!”

She doesn’t open her eyes, just her mouth, and when she speaks, she speaks with the other sleepwalkers.

“ **Wᴇ Sᴘᴇᴀᴋ As Oɴᴇ** ,” they say, their voices mixing into a single sound.

“ **Dɪᴘᴀᴋᴀ, ᴄʜɪʟᴅ** ,” they say. The sound pounds at them as Dip backs up away from the sleepwalkers. It resounds like a heartbeat, loud, from within, heard with something other than their ears.

“ **Wᴇ ᴀʀᴇ Sᴘᴇᴀᴋ As Oɴᴇ**.”

The sound turns to a pressure, that builds in the back of their head until that bleeds into their vision like the red of their dreams reaching from their mind and spilling out to their eyes. From behind them, they can feel something behind them like a heat from a radiator, except, not heat, but static.

Turning around shows Dip nothing, only the sense of moving through something intangible, but the growing creep of dread keeps their eyes fixed open, looking for any sign of danger. The sleepwalkers were creepy, not dangerous… right?

“ **Yᴏᴜ ᴡɪʟʟ ʜᴇʟᴘ ᴜs**.”

The throbbing in their head only gets stronger and stronger until they feel something invisible seize their face. They flinch, squeeze their eyes shut, and suddenly, something shines into their face, a light that glows brighter and brighter till it turns into a sun, that brightens and surrounds them and pulls them, up and up and up till it’s clear it’s some sort of a tunnel they’re speeding through and they’re ascending, higher and

higher and

 

higher-

 

warm,

 

accepted,

 

loved.

 

Home.

 

And then they wake up.

Real life is a shock, after the dream. It was nearly too real, their heart was still pounding in their ears. But it wasn't more real than the cool, damp air of the early autumn morning they suck in through their nose, or the weight of the blankets over their legs. Someone starts up a car in the neighborhood and pulls out of a driveway, engine sputtering gently. Through all of it, their brother turns around in bed, still breathing softly.

The clock tells them it’s 6:28 am, two minutes before their alarm rings for school. Dip takes a deep breath and closes their eyes for the few moments before they’re supposed to wake up for real.

It’s only when they rise again that they realize they’re still wearing the jacket from the dream.

 

* * *

 

Their classes pass in a haze until lunch, when they nearly fall asleep in their mashed potatoes.

Another tray slides across the table until it collides with theirs with a crack that startles them awake. Lynn Castillo, one of their neighbors. They were both juniors, and so they traveled to school together every so often. She was the sort of person who could never seem to put on weight, all angles and bones, no matter how much she ate, and she ate a lot. Her dark hair was cropped boyishly short and long nose had healed over badly once when it had been broken.

Dip liked her well enough but they were pretty different. Dip kept to themself while Lynn was somewhat of a social butterfly, so their social circles didn’t cross much. Every so often though, she would stop to chat.

“Dude you look wrecked,” she says as she slides in next to them. “You been sleeping or what?”

“Hi to you too,” Dip says wearily. “Nightmares and stuff. It’s sucked.”

Lynn leans over, propping a bony elbow on the table and sticking a soggy fry in the corner of her mouth.

“You been blacking out?” she asks. “Things been different when you wake up?”

Dip frowns, as they remember the jacket from the morning.

“Yeah,” they say, uncertain. “Sometimes.”

“I woke up once out on the tracks in the forest covered in dirt,” Lynn says matter-of-factly, “Weirdest dang thing.”

“I’ve woken in the bathtub once,” Dip says. “But that was it.”

They hesitate a moment. “Do you get the weird dreams too?” they ask. “Like… you ever hear the phrase, ‘We speak as one?’”

Lynn freezes, her eyes darting around the cafeteria.

“Oh man,” she says way too casually. “That sounds wild. What’s up with that? Anyway. A bunch of kids have been blacking out and waking up in weird places. There’s like a club or something to talk about it? The Blackout Club. We’re meeting after school, if you wanna chat about it.”

“Lynn?” Dip raises an eyebrow. “What aren’t you telling me?”

Obviously she was hiding something. She knew something about this weirdness, but she wasn’t willing to say it here. Maybe the club would have more answers but-

“I can’t come to the meeting,” Dip says. “I have to pick up my little brother after school and get my mom her medication. So just _tell_ me.”

“Uh,” Lynn says, avoiding their gaze. She’s such a bad liar, Dip can see her practically sliding under the table to avoid looking at them. “Iiiiii can’t say anything right now. Come tomorrow maybe?”

Dip rolls their eyes. “Fine,” they say. “After I drop my brother home.”

“Cool!” she exclaims, pushing herself upright again. “I’ll see you then!”

 

* * *

 

Dip stifles a yawn behind a sleeve as they take their brother’s hand.

At nine years of age, Lochan was already shooting up like a weed- he was at Dip’s shoulder now. It’d be precious few years before their baby brother would tower over them, not that they were very tall in the first place.

Dip steers him through the tall pharmacy shelves full of medicines and supplements as he talks about his day.

“Ariel told me that stars are actually really really really big,” he says. “They’re just very far away so far we can’t see them so well.”

“He’s right,” Dip replies. “Did you know the sun is a star? Just much closer.”

“Yeah!” Lochan says. “Ariel said that too!”

The back of the pharmacy has a window with a pharmacist leaning out of it. A white lady with her brown hair cut short and a mousy smile.

“What can I do for you kids today?” she asks.

“I’m picking up a prescription for Esha Chakladar?” Dip says, pulling up to the window to fish in their backpack for their wallet. Their mother had given them the sixty dollars for the copay and a copy of her insurance card. “Date of birth 6/23/71.”

The pharmacist taps at her computer. “Oh yeah,” she says. “Here it is. Requip, right? Do you have insurance? The card we have on file looks like it’s expired.”

“Oh yeah,” Dip says. “I’ve got….” They check their wallet. The card’s not there. They had brought it downstairs but had they put the slip into their backpack? “Hold on.”

They sling their bag to the ground and start going through their bag. It’s lucky there are no other people in the store at the moment, but as they paw through their bag, it’s just not there. In the exhausted haze from the morning with all of the bad dreams and the weirdness with the jacket, they must have forgotten it.

“I... don’t have it,” Dip says finally, zipping their backpack up and staring down at the counter. “How much is it without insurance?”

There’s a pause long enough that they glance back up at the pharmacist, who sighs.

“You’re not gonna be able to pay it, kid,” she says. “It’s 595 dollars.”

Dip’s stomach falls out from under them.

“Oh,” they say weakly. That was a lot of money for a month’s worth of medication. And they thought sixty was bad.

“What about mommy’s medicine?” Lochan whispers. Dip puts an arm around their little brother, squeezing him close, thinking fast.

“It’s okay,” they say. “I’ll take you home, then I’ll find the card and come get it myself, okay? We’ll get the medicine. Don’t worry.”

“Okay,” Lochan says, grabbing onto their shirt and giving them a hug. Dip offers the pharmacist an awkward smile and a wave and pries their brother off of him to take him home.

Last year, they had noticed their mother change. Her smiles were different, lopsided. Her hands trembled until it was hard enough to cook that Dip took over.  She had more frequent headaches and she was tired more often. After many, many visits to the doctor, their mom pulled them aside and told them she had developed something called Parkinson’s disease.

She told them that she would always have it and it would get worse, but it would be a long time before that happened. She told them not to worry because she would be okay, and medicine would help her to make sure she could take care of them.

It did help, enough that her smile straightened and she could cook again, but Dip still insisted on making meals for the three of them every so often.

When the siblings arrive home, their mother’s beaten them to it, asleep on the couch still in her business clothes. Dip presses a finger to their lips and pushes their brother gently towards the stairs.

Lochan nods, grabs his backpack straps and quietly creeps up to their room. Dip walks quietly towards the living room, careful not to creak the stairs.

Their mom was sprawled out on the couch which was a little too short for her. One foot dangles over the armrest, the other leg dangling off the cushion. She had pulled a quilt on top of her, but it had slid off at some point. Her breathing was slow and even, her eyes shut and her wrinkles smoothed out. Her hair’s still plaited in her usual long braid, like she came home and immediately dropped for a nap.

If she was home early from work, she must not have been feeling well. It was frightening to think about that encroaching weakness. She’d always been so steady, like an oak in a storm. They’d seen her crack once, after their dad died, but this sickness was more of slow burn, that ate her up insides first. It was good that she got some rest.

Dip grabs the quilt off the floor and covers their mother again, but with the movement, her eyes flutter open.

“Mmm,” she murmurs and stretches, pushing herself back up to a sitting position. “Dipaka, how was your day?”

“Fine, mom,” they say. “You’re home early.”

Sleepily, she pats the couch next to her and yawns, rubbing her eyes.

“I had another migraine,” she says, holding out an arm for Dip to slide under. They oblige, tucking their feet under them and leaning on her shoulder as she drapes an arm around them. “I’m feeling much better now though. CHORUS can deal with my absence for half a day.”

She gives them a squeeze, rubbing their shoulder comfortingly. Dip wraps their own arms around her neck to give her a hug back, taking a deep breath of the familiar smell of her favorite cherry blossom lotion.

They had smelled it in their dreams too, when she had grabbed them and spoke in that strange voice. They hold on tighter. She runs her fingers in smooth circles across their back. The dream had been so real but it was hard to think that in their mother’s warm arms.

“Dipaka, sweetheart,” she murmurs. “What’s wrong?”

“Bad dreams,” they reply, muffled in her shirt. “I dreamed you were- you were different. Like you were there, just- just gone.”

Parkinson’s was degenerative and incurable. She was okay now, but in the coming years the disease would eat away at who she was and there was really nothing anyone could do about it.

Their mom presses a kiss to their head.

“Noyoner moni,” she says. “My sweetest child. We’re not there yet, alright? That’s a bridge we’ll meet later.”

Dip nods into her shoulder, still pressing their face into her shoulder. Hot tears spill into her suit jacket and they push themself away to push up their glasses and wipe their face with their sleeves.

Their mom takes them by the shoulders and runs a warm thumb across their cheek, with only the faintest of tremors. She looks into their eyes with her warm, gentle gaze, the skin around her eyes crinkling with fondness.

“I want you to remember that no matter what happens to me,” she says, pressing a hand to her heart. “I will always, always love you. You and Lochan both. Alright?”  

Dip nods again, wiping away their tears.

“And I forgot the insurance card today,” they murmur sheepishly. “I need to go back to the pharmacy to get your medicine.”

Their mom shakes her head and smiles fondly. Raising a hand, she ruffles their hair.

“It’s fine, Dipaka,” she says. “You look like you haven’t slept. You take a nap and I can go pick up my medicine.”

“But-” they protest, cut off by a sharp shake of her head.

“Dip, you’re so much like your father sometimes,” she says. “So serious and responsible. But I’m sick, not incapable, and I’m still your mother. So get some rest before you do your homework. Lochan is upstairs?”

They nod as their mom stands back up, smiling gently down at them.

“Sleep,” she says. “I’ll take care of it.”

And so Dip does.

They dream in reds again. Their hands are red outlines in the fog, and they leave bright footsteps among dozens of hundreds of trails, spread in an array that draws towards a single dotted line that leads straight to the horizon.

Hesitant, Dip stays still, until they see a figure form in front of them, outlined in red. It’s a person, not much taller than they are, with a square face and a paunchy stomach. It’s achingly familiar.

“Dad!” they cry out, but he doesn’t hear them, merely travels the path. His figure walks as they run, but no matter what they do, he draws further and further ahead.

They hear singing. From their side, the outline of their mom skips ahead of them and a wordless song, high and lovely swoops from her voice.

“Mom!” they yell, but she doesn’t hear them, just runs towards their dad. His deep voice joins in with her song as they step together and run, faster and further ahead as Dip gives futile chase.

As they run another voice joins the song, and another, until music builds into an enormous chord in a harmony of hundreds. They run until their parents disappear, until Dip is only surrounded by the music, and the single red line of footsteps their parents followed.

Dip slows then, and stops, but the song doesn’t, only builds in a hundred voices that swell in the boundless red void. It’s coming from all around them in ceaseless harmonies that thrum with meaning denser than any one word.

For a moment they can make out nothing. Then, in the song, layers of voices speak in an echo of itself.

 

**Oɴᴇ ᴠᴏɪᴄᴇ ᴀᴍᴏɴɢ ʜᴜɴᴅʀᴇᴅs ɪs ᴡᴇᴀᴋ. Sᴇᴘᴀʀᴀᴛɪᴏɴ ɪs Isᴏʟᴀᴛɪᴏɴ.**

**Wᴇ Sᴘᴇᴀᴋ As Oɴᴇ.**

 

Dip wakes up, but upright, cramped, aching, and confused. They’re not on the couch were they fell asleep. They’re huddled in the dark of their coat closet, in front of the utilities panel. The song from their dream still echoes in their head, and no matter how much they try to shake it out, it doesn’t fade.

 

**Oᴘᴇɴ ᴛʜᴇ ᴘᴀɴᴇʟ.**

Dip pushes the closet door open instead, standing and rolling their neck around. Did they sleepwalk? The sky is still light- they couldn’t have slept for very long. Maybe the lack of sleep was giving them hallucinations.

“Mom?” they call out. “Lochan?”

 

**Yᴏᴜʀ ᴍᴏᴛʜᴇʀ ᴀɴᴅ ʙʀᴏᴛʜᴇʀ ʜᴀᴠᴇ ʟᴇꜰᴛ. Oᴘᴇɴ ᴛʜᴇ ᴘᴀɴᴇʟ.**

 

Dip’s throat seizes up. Hallucinations weren’t supposed to respond to you, were they?

“Hello?” they ask cautiously.

 

**Hᴇʟʟᴏ. **Oᴘᴇɴ ᴛʜᴇ ᴘᴀɴᴇʟ.****

 

They swallow. It's like their bones are humming with the words, rather than hearing them with their ears. 

“I don’t think it’s a good idea to listen to weird voices in my head,” Dip whispers aloud. “Especially when they tell me to open up hazardous panels that could electrocute me.”

 

**Iᴛ ᴡɪʟʟ ɴᴏᴛ. Oᴘᴇɴ ᴛʜᴇ ᴘᴀɴᴇʟ, Dɪᴘᴀᴋᴀ Cʜᴀᴋʟᴀᴅᴀʀ.**

 

Their mother always told them never to touch it, that behind the panel was a complicated set of wire and tubes that could be difficult to repair if they broke anything, and dangerous for children to mess with electricity. She was a manager with the utilities section of CHORUS, and knew first hand what happened when something went wrong. 

But the song thrums insistently and with it pounding in their head, Dip digs their fingernails carefully into the side of the panel- and gasps when the only thing behind it is a ladder that leads into a tunnel that looks like it’s been hewn out of solid stone.

 

**Gᴏ ᴅᴏᴡɴ.**

 

This time Dip doesn’t need the extra encouragement as they slide down the ladder. The tunnel is dark, so they fish out their phone and turn the flashlight on, descending into the underground.

Redacre used to be a mining town before they lost the vein. CHORUS had taken over the tunnels and shut them down, but this did not look like it had been abandoned. LED light strips twine around piping in the stone tunnels, and there’s a faint light at the end of the tunnel.

Even if they had been using the tunnels for utilities, this was a path into their _house_ , open for anyone who knew about it.

“What is this place?” Dip wonders aloud. “Does Mom know about this?”  

There’s no answer from the song, even as it gets louder and louder as they travel down the tunnel. The tunnel curves downward in a smooth line until the rock changes, turning pale and white, opening up until it’s three times their height. They can see the end as they approach. The tunnel empties out to a cavern so large Dip can barely see the bottom. There’s a metal walkway they can stand on that circles the hole, and leads to other tunnels and caverns.  
  
Did they all lead to houses in Redacre? What was CHORUS doing down here?

Without further instructions from the song, Dip wanders up the walkway spiral and ducks into a tunnel that leads to another room carved out of white stone. Down here, they’re not sure if they hear the song with their ears or their mind. Strings looping from wall to wall vibrate in near harmony through the tunnels and pockets that weave in and out of the stone and around the wooden supports. How long did it take CHORUS to build all this?

The center of the room stands some strange instrument, with keys like a piano arranged in a circle. A door, perfectly red in the blue light of the room stands at the other end, the white insignia of an eye staring back at them. They step onto the platform, the dim blue light and lay a hand gently on the keys.

“Does my mom know about this?” Dip demands again. “Why are you showing me this? What do you want?”

 

**Yᴏᴜʀ ᴍᴏᴛʜᴇʀ ᴡᴀʟᴋs ᴡɪᴛʜɪɴ ᴛʜᴇ sᴏɴɢ. Bᴜᴛ sʜᴇ sʟᴇᴇᴘs. Sʜᴇ ᴅᴏᴇs ɴᴏᴛ ᴋɴᴏᴡ.**

 

Dip blinks back tears, and grabs their arms where their mother had grabbed them in the dream. But-

“So it wasn’t a dream,” they say.

 

**Iᴛ ᴡᴀs ɴᴏᴛ.**

 

Their next words rip out of them. “So why are you doing this!? Why me?”

 

**Bᴇᴄᴀᴜsᴇ ʏᴏᴜ sᴜꜰꜰᴇʀ, ᴄʜɪʟᴅ.**

 

Dip swallows their next words as the song swells. It swallows up what they could possibly say, so they stand still in the light, clutching their arms to themselves.

 

**Yᴏᴜ ʟᴏɴɢ ꜰᴏʀ ʏᴏᴜʀ ꜰᴀᴛʜᴇʀ. Yᴏᴜ ꜰᴇᴀʀ ʟᴏsɪɴɢ ʏᴏᴜʀ ᴍᴏᴛʜᴇʀ.**

 

The song hits them like a truck. After their father’s death, their life had been uprooted, and moved to Redacre. Dip never wanted anything like that to happen again, but then their mother had gotten sick.

 

**Pᴀɪɴ ᴀɴᴅ sᴜꜰꜰᴇʀɪɴɢ ɪs ᴀɴ ɪʟʟᴜsɪᴏɴ. Cʀᴇᴀᴛᴇᴅ ʙʏ sᴇᴘᴀʀᴀᴛɪᴏɴ.**

 

The sound of their breathing is as loud as the song in their head.

 

**Wɪᴛʜɪɴ ᴛʜᴇ sᴏɴɢ, ʏᴏᴜ ᴡɪʟʟ ɴᴇᴠᴇʀ ʟᴏsᴇ ʏᴏᴜʀ ᴍᴏᴛʜᴇʀ. Aʟʟ ᴛʜᴀᴛ sʜᴇ ɪs ᴡɪʟʟ ʙᴇ ᴇɴᴄᴏᴅᴇᴅ.**

 

Their next breath definitely sounds a little like a sob, and the feeling in their chest is a little like someone just sucker punched them, as they clutch at their shirt. Did the song understand what it was offering them? To never lose another parent?

“W-what do you mean, encoded?” Dip asks. Their voice comes out sounding a little watery.

 

**Hᴇʀ ʙᴏᴅʏ ᴍᴀʏ ꜰᴀɪʟ ʙᴜᴛ sʜᴇ ᴡɪʟʟ ʟɪᴠᴇ ᴡɪᴛʜɪɴ ᴛʜᴇ sᴏɴɢ.**

 

Living within the song? Like they had seen the last night? The body of their mother chanting at them, grabbing them too tight- that wasn’t their mother. Even if the song saved some part of her mind, what was the difference between that and handing them and Lochan a scrapbook of moments?

That still wouldn’t be their mother. The song couldn’t save her steady hands, her warm smile, or the scent of her cherry blossom lotion. It would just run her ragged doing who knows what instead of resting properly, in her bed. The song would eat at her as surely as her illness.

“Why are you telling me this?” they whisper.

 

**Wᴇ ʀᴇǫᴜɪʀᴇ ᴀssɪsᴛᴀɴᴄᴇ. Cʟɪᴍʙ ᴛᴏ ᴛʜᴇ ʀᴀꜰᴛᴇʀs.**

 

Dip looks around wildly. “What?” they ask. “Climb?”

 

**Hᴜʀʀʏ.**

 

The song swells, in the rush, and Dip spots a pile of crates they clamber on top of. The rafters aren’t much higher than their head so they grab onto the column and pull themself up and perch near the ceiling to hold on.

Something changes in the song. It turns to an intensity in their head where they feel something ominous approaching. Then someone runs into the room underneath them bolting. It’s a kid, wearing a bandana tied around their nose. Chasing them is an adult, in a white uniform with a white cloth tied around their face.

“Let him guide you home!” he calls, staggering forward with his hands stretched out in front of them. He’s asleep, Dip realizes. He lunges for the teen and grabs them. They watch, horrified as the kid raises a hand and stabs him in the face. The masked adult crumples.

 

**Tʜᴇʀᴇ ᴀʀᴇ ᴛʜᴏsᴇ ᴛʜᴀᴛ ʀᴇsɪsᴛ.**

 

The kid steps back, panting, and tears the bandana off their face. In the dim light Dip can still make out her cropped hair and broken nose. It’s Lynn. She takes another glance around, but she doesn’t look up. Instead, she just runs off deeper into the underground.

 

**Uɴʀᴜʟʏ ᴄʜɪʟᴅʀᴇɴ ɪɴᴛᴇʀꜰᴇʀᴇ ᴡɪᴛʜ ᴏᴜʀ ᴘʟᴀɴs. Tʜᴇʏ ᴄᴀʟʟ ᴛʜᴇᴍsᴇʟᴠᴇs-**

 

“The Blackout Club,” Dip whispers.

 

**Tᴏ ʙʀɪɴɢ ᴛʜᴇᴍ ɪɴᴛᴏ ᴛʜᴇ sᴏɴɢ, ᴛʜᴇʏ ᴍᴜsᴛ ʙᴇ ᴄᴀᴜɢʜᴛ. Tᴏ ᴄᴀᴛᴄʜ ᴛʜᴇᴍ, ᴛʜᴇʏ ᴍᴜsᴛ ʙᴇ sᴇᴇɴ.**

 

Dip eases themself off the rafters onto the crates again and steals down to check on the downed sleepwalker.

There’s no blood, like they were afraid of, and they can see their chest rise and fall. Lynn dropped her weapon- it was some sort of dart. They pick it up- it reads in small white letters “large animal tranquilizer.” Dip feels a little faint.

 

**Rᴇᴄᴏʀᴅ ᴛʜᴇᴍ ᴀɴᴅ ᴡᴇ ᴡɪʟʟ ᴄᴀʀᴇ ꜰᴏʀ ʏᴏᴜʀ ᴍᴏᴛʜᴇʀ’s ʙᴏᴅʏ ᴀɴᴅ ᴍɪɴᴅ.**

 Where had Lynn gotten tranquilizers? Dip lets the spent dart clatter to the floor and presses their fingers to the adult's neck. His pulse is strong, at least. The sleepwalkers- they were all people they  _knew,_ weren't they? And Lynn had just stabbed him. And they had watched her do it.

 

**Gᴏ ʙᴀᴄᴋ ʜᴏᴍᴇ. Yᴏᴜʀ ꜰᴀᴍɪʟʏ ʀᴇᴛᴜʀɴs.**

 

Numb, Dip runs back the way they came. The trip doesn’t seem to take as long the second time. They climb the ladder back into their closet and place the utilities panel back in place when they hear the front door open.

They scramble out of the closet and out to greet their mom and Lochan.

“Dip!” Lochan cries. “We got ice cream!” He holds up a gallon of mint chocolate chip.

Their mom laughs and ruffles his hair.

“We thought you might like some of your favorite-“ she says, then looks back up at Dip. She frowns, then reaches for their forehead, arm outstretched. “Are you alright? You look clammy.”

They dodge her hand, the song still ringing in their ears as they bound up the stairs.

“I’m fine!” they call out. “I just- I just did a bunch of jumping jacks to wake up! Hold on let me wash my face!”

They run for the bathroom and turn on the sink full blast and splash their face. The song still rings in their head.

“Are you still there?” they whisper, looking themself in the mirror. They don’t look great. The skin under their eyes have bags underneath them, behind their glasses, and there’s a sallow tinge to their brown skin.

 

**Wᴇ ᴀʀᴇ.**

 

“What happens if I don’t help you?”

 

**Wᴇ ᴡɪʟʟ ɴᴏ ʟᴏɴɢᴇʀ ᴀssɪsᴛ ʏᴏᴜʀ ᴍᴏᴛʜᴇʀ.**

 

Dip grips the rim of the sink until their knuckles turn white. Their chest moves, but it feels like no air is coming in.

Body and mind, the song had said. CHORUS communities had been a blessing after their father’s death. CHORUS had given their mom a job and a house, after they could no longer afford their New York City apartment. Their health insurance came from CHORUS.

And it was CHORUS who hid away those strange twisting tunnels and the vibrating strings and instruments that echoed with otherworldly music.

“So,” and their voice breaks on the word. “If I don’t help you, my mom’s boss at CHORUS will know?”

The song hums as they hold their breath, looking up at the lights in the bathroom. 

 

**Cʟᴇᴠᴇʀ ᴄʜɪʟᴅ. Mᴀᴋᴇ ʏᴏᴜʀ ᴄʜᴏɪᴄᴇ ᴄᴀʀᴇꜰᴜʟʟʏ.**

 

The song in their mind finally goes quiet.

 

* * *

 

It’s no choice at all, in the end.

It's strange to greet Lynn normally the next day, like they hadn't seen her plunge a dart into another person's face. Lynn welcomes them to the Blackout Club, introduced them to a few of the others. Most of the missing kids in Redacre had fled to the club, for one reason or another, but some of them were just dead. Some of them, including Isabela Mani-Shaw were just gone.

It seems more reasonable then, that she'd stab someone like that, but the thought of violence still forms a pit in their stomach. 

But they do learn more from the club than they did the song. There was more than one voice. There were many voices. Speak As One was the one who controlled the sleepers and the lucids, as they were called.

Anyone could be a Lucid, so she hadn’t wanted to tell them about it at school, just in case a lucid teacher came by. You never knew, apparently, when someone could be working for CHORUS. It's an irony they can barely stomach. 

She wanted to know if they would join them at the hideout, but Dip refused. It’d be too dangerous, they said. They had a family to look out for, but they were rooting for them. If they could offer help they would.

That, at least, was true.

But what else could they do? Speak As One had their mother and they had no idea how to get them out of her head. They couldn’t throw everything away like the other kids. Their family needed them.

The song rings in their head as Dip readies themself for a night’s work. The clock on the bedside table shows the midnight hour as they slip into exercise clothes. They had their phone charged, and sensible shoes. Gloves too, for gripping and climbing.

They can hear their mother from their room, shuffling out again to do whatever work the song was telling her to do.

“Are you watching?” they murmur.

Lochan turns in his bed. “ **Wᴇ ᴀʀᴇ ᴀʟᴡᴀʏs ᴡᴀᴛᴄʜɪɴɢ**.” he says in a hoarse whisper, his eyes still shut, asleep.

**Author's Note:**

> The encounters with SAO are entirely of my own creation and not based on any in game interactions. It should be said that my in game tbc kid is not a fan of SAO at all and so far i have had exactly 1) line of dialogue with them so this is all based off of other people's encounters. We don't really know all that much about what the stalkers know or how they're recruited, so a lot of this is off of my speculation and extrapolation from game play.
> 
> Dip’s family are Bengali immigrants. New York is mentioned as it is the home of the largest Bangladeshi American population in the US. 
> 
> Dipaka is a Sanskrit name for “inflaming”
> 
> Esha is Sanskrit for “desire, wish”
> 
> Lochan means “the eye” in Sanskrit.
> 
> “Noyoner moni” is a Bengali endearment that translates roughly to “jewel of my eye”


End file.
